


knowing

by skuls



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Major Character Undeath, Season/Series 04, i envision the timsasha to be romantic but it can be read as platonic, theres some very very background jm pining here too (but not enough to tag)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:28:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25862824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skuls/pseuds/skuls
Summary: Jon falters, looks at the ground, one hand over his mouth. "You… you were both in the same place. In a… domain. D-Daisy was in one, too, a different one. I got her out. And I… I thought, afterwards, that maybe I could get the two of you back, too."---Or: After the Unknowing, after the Buried, Jon finds Sasha and Tim again.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood & Sasha James & Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist & Tim Stoker, Sasha James & Tim Stoker, Sasha James/Tim Stoker
Comments: 9
Kudos: 184





	knowing

**Author's Note:**

> this was an exercise in writing something short (for ONCE). originally this was a longer idea that i didn't want to write simply because of how much work i have left on hidden statement, but my idea for an opening scene stuck with me, and i really wanted to write it. i'm not sure how i feel about the end product, but i had fun with the concept. i definitely did try to diverge from other tim or sasha return fics i've read.

When she comes to, lying somewhere on a hard surface, she's got calliope music ringing in her head. The faint sounds of a circus she doesn't remember going to. Her vision is spotty, spinning and uneven, and she lets her head fall back against the floor, just to make the spinning stop. Above her, somewhere, someone says,  _ Sasha?  _ and she shuts her eyes, thinking,  _ Sasha. My name is Sasha.  _ Her name is Sasha James and her heart is beating too hard against her ribs. 

She's on the floor among a cluster of boxes piled high with papers, papers on the floor, and tape recorders, of all things, and Sasha blinks in surprise and realizes suddenly that she must be in the Archives. Things are starting to solidify, starting to unblur at the edges, and it's all clicking together now. She's in the Archives, she works in the Archives. Her head is pounding. Sasha tries to sit up, reaches out for the last thing she remembers, and comes up fuzzy. Something with worms, maybe. An infestation at work. She shuts her eyes and sees a swirl of colors, blurry and obscured faces laughing at her, dolls with dead eyes, or maybe mannequins. The circus music is mostly gone, ringing absently in her ears. 

"Sasha?" the voice says again, and it's only then that Sasha realizes someone is holding her hand. She knows that voice; she looks to the right and sees Jon attached to that hand, staring at her with deep concern in his eyes. It is Jon—Sasha knows this on instinct—but he looks so much different than she's used to. Longer hair, a tired look about him, a million different scars that she isn't sure he had before. She wonders, distantly, what happened, but her tongue is too thick to form the question. Jon squeezes her hand, staring at her with concern. "Are you all right?"

"Oh," she says faintly. "I—my head hurts." She leans back, her spine hitting a pile of boxes that thankfully don't give with her weight. 

Jon swallows nervously. "That… might be an aftereffect. But you're safe now. You're safe. You can relax."

"Right," Sasha says, swallowing dryly. Jon turns, and asks someone else if they are okay, and despite the dizziness, Sasha needs to look. She lifts her head, ignoring the black dots across her vision, and looks past Jon, and relief rolls through her at the sight of who else is here. She recognizes him quicker, even with a similar unfamiliar weatherbeaten look about him. It's Tim. That's Tim, lying back against the floor, too, holding onto Jon's other hand, his eyes mostly closed, and the relief of seeing him is so strong that Sasha would go and help him up, if it felt like she could move. "Tim," she says, too quietly; she doesn't think Tim hears her. 

"Tim?" Jon asks again, almost tentatively, and Tim's head rolls against the ground. He speaks, muffedly, and it takes a moment for Sasha to make out the word: "Danny."

Jon's face twists, almost guiltily, and he pulls his hand out of Tim's like he's been burned. "I couldn't find him. I… I wasn't sure who to look for. I'm sorry. I'm so… we'll go back. When you're ready, we'll… we'll go back." 

_ What is he talking about?  _ Sasha thinks faintly, uncertain, because she knows that Tim's brother is dead. (And she also didn't realize that Jon  _ knew  _ about Tim's brother.) But that doesn't matter, because Tim's eyes are opening, just a little, and he's saying, "Sasha?" In a pleading sort of tone. Like  _ she's _ lost. Like she isn't right there. Sasha blinks, slowly, shapes sharpening and dizziness fading, and when her eyes shut, she sees a strange wasteland full of faceless people and hears a familiar voice screaming her name.  _ Sasha! Sasha! _

"She's here. She's right here," says Jon, voice choked. "She came back with us." 

Tim scans the space above them before shutting his eyes again, like the effort is too much. "Tim?" Sasha says again, louder this time, and when Jon looks back at her, she says, "What's  _ wrong  _ with him?" loudly as she can. 

The sadness and guilt all over Jon's face never really leaves when he tries to explain, clumsily. "He's, uh… he's having some trouble adjusting, I think. Leaving a domain can be… difficult."

"A  _ domain _ ?" Sasha says in disbelief, sitting up straighter. "Jon, what's going on?" 

But he doesn't have time to answer because voices are echoing from further into the office, ones Sasha doesn't recognize. Someone saying, "Jon? You're back?" and someone else saying, "You should have told me. Both of you should have told me, so I could've told you not to run off into  _ another _ domain, almost get yourself killed again…" 

And then two women Sasha's never seen before are standing in front of them, words cut off with astonishment, staring open-mouthed at the three of them like it's the most astonishing sight in the world. "You… did it," says the shorter, dark-haired one, like she can't actually believe it. Jon just nods tiredly. 

"Not the first time he's done it," says the taller one, with a strange sort of approval. 

"Is that… is that really him? How do you know it isn't someone they've switched out?" The shorter one steps towards Tim and says, "Tim?" in a prodding sort of voice. Tim says nothing.

"It's them," Jon says, firmer this time. Like there's no argument. "I know." And the way he says  _ know  _ sounds official, makes it sound like they should understand what he means. It's odd. 

The taller woman inclines her head towards Sasha questioningly. "This is Sasha, then?"

"Yes," Sasha says, maybe a little curtly. "I'm Sasha." She still has no idea who these women are, or how they know who she is, but she notices one thing: they both look to be in bad shape, akin to Tim and Jon. Not covered in the little pockmark scars like they are, but still; the dark-haired woman has a haunted look in her eyes. The taller woman is startlingly thin, with a similar look of sadness in her face, almost hollow. Like they've all been through things she doesn't know about. 

"Daisy," says the taller woman. "And this is Basira." Basira looks over at Sasha, away from Tim, briefly, without saying anything. 

Sasha scrubs her hands over her face and turns to Jon, says, "What did you… what did she… what did she mean, switching Tim out? That… that's Tim. That's  _ Tim _ ." She looks at Tim again, eyes open and unfocused, still mostly lying on the ground. Still hearing his voice shouting her name. She wants to reach for his hand but he's too far away. 

"It is," says Jon, gentler than she's used to from him. "It is. It's Tim. I… water." He stands, a little unsteadily, saying, "You should… you both must be thirsty, I can get you some…"

"Sit down," Basira says, a bit sternly. "I'll get it. You look like you're about to keel over, too."

Jon swallows hard before sitting back down beside them. "Martin… someone should tell Martin. He—he'd want to know, he… he isn't as far gone as that." There's a lilt at the end of the sentence, like it's a question, and Sasha dimly notices that she's never heard Jon say Martin's name like that. Like he's…  _ gone  _ or something. She realizes with a horrified rush that he  _ might  _ be, and starts to ask, but then Daisy says, "I'll get him. He can tear himself away from Lukas for  _ this _ ."

Jon nods, gratefully. Basira and Daisy move to leave the room and Sasha turns to Jon and speaks anyway, unable to keep herself from asking. "Wh-where is Martin? Is he all right?"

A complicated set of emotions flicker across Jon's face before he says, "Yes, h-he's fine," in a tone that halfway makes Sasha think he's lying. He's still got ahold of her hand, she realizes; he seems to notice for the first time and squeezes it before letting go. "He'll be… very happy to see you," he adds quietly. "The both of you." 

That doesn't make sense, not really, and Sasha shakes her head a little at that because it doesn't make sense, she just saw Martin this morning—in the storage room, hiding from Prentiss and her worms, in fact. But that doesn't make sense, because Jon and Tim didn't have these scars this morning, and these women Sasha doesn't recognize weren't here, and this—this isn't right, because Prentiss clearly isn't here anymore, and Sasha realizes now that she can't ever remember her leaving, or dying. Can't remember anything, in fact, outside of pushing Tim out of the way and running upstairs to get help from Elias and ending up in—in Artifact Storage. 

_ Oh.  _ Oh. 

Sasha feels tears welling up behind her eyes, and she tries to speak steadily when she says, "How long was I gone, Jon?" Pain and fear in her head. An age-old scream echoing in her throat. 

Jon looks shocked, at first, and then understanding comes over him. And guilt again, apology. She hasn't seen him tripping over himself to apologize this much in a long time. "A, uh, about a year and a half," he says quietly. 

Sasha swipes quickly at her cheeks, looks over at Tim, whose eyes are still mostly closed. Hears it again: the calliope music, the whirling carousel, the faceless people laughing and screaming. And Tim, stumbling through the crowd, screaming two names over and over again. Danny's, and hers. 

(She hadn't known it was Tim. Hadn't known, except it had been so long since she'd heard someone say her name. When she asked it, people told her she had no name. But she recognized it when he said it. She'd gone and tried to catch his hands, insisted again and again,  _ It's me, that's me _ . But he hadn't recognized her. He hadn't known her and she hadn't known him and he hadn't been able to find him. 

Sasha doesn't remember much of anything from the in-between. Between that thing leaning and looming over her, and waking up here. She remembers Jon finding her, she thinks, asking her name in a trembling voice and helping her to her feet. And she remembers Tim looking. And she remembers not knowing who he was.)

"That's…" she says, voice breaking. "That's a long time."

"Yes," Jon says softly, sounding nearly on the verge of tears himself. "Yes, it is."

Sasha swallows hard, looks at the ground. There's three tape recorders at her feet; she doesn't remember them ever having this  _ many _ . "And it… it got Tim?" she says, voice high. "It took Tim, too?"

"Oh… oh, no. Not… it was… different. He…" Jon falters, looks at the ground, one hand over his mouth. "You… you were both in the same place. In a… domain. D-Daisy was in one, too, a different one. I got her out. And I… I thought, afterwards, that maybe I could get the two of you back, too." He chokes a little on his words. "I suppose… I suppose it worked." 

"I… yeah. Yeah." Sasha blinks back more tears, staring at the tape recorders. Tim forgot her, and the others might have, too, she isn't sure, and she's been… missing or gone or dead for almost two years of her life. She's lost all this time she'll never get back. But… but she is back, now. She's back. She's alive.

"Thank you," she adds quietly, and looks up at Jon with real gratitude. He looks almost shocked at that, but then he nods, one hand on her arm. 

"Oh my god." 

The new voice is actually familiar this time, and when Sasha turns to find it, she sees Melanie King there, the YouTuber from Ghost Hunt UK, staring at the three of them in the same way that those Basira and Daisy people did, like she's seen a ghost. "Is that… it isn't," she says, almost horrified. 

Jon nods, as if confirming something. "Melanie King?" Sasha says faintly, in almost genuine disbelief. She  _ likes _ Melanie—that faint memory is there—but she wasn't expecting to see her standing in the Archives after coming back from the fucking dead. 

"They're  _ alive _ ?" says Melanie, voice breaking. "Tim?"

Tim stirs a little on the ground, moving like he's going to sit up, and Sasha's eyes yank over to him immediately. "I—Melanie?" he says, murky and gruff with confusion. "Jon?" 

Melanie has both hands over her mouth, looking at Sasha now. "And that's—Sasha, that's Sasha," she says. "The real Sasha." Jon nods again. Melanie shuts her eyes, nearly swaying in place. "Oh my god. Oh my  _ god _ ."

"Sasha?" Tim says, suddenly, and it's not like the way he was saying it before—searching and panicked. Sasha turns back to Tim and his dark eyes are on her, wide and worried and confused and almost hopeful. 

"Hi, Tim," she says softly, and wishes she didn't want to cry. He was looking for her, before; does he even know it is her now? 

Tim looks to Jon, to Melanie, looking desperately for confirmation. "This is—this is Sasha," he says, an echo of Melanie's question earlier. They both nod, Jon with more assurance than all of them. Tim looks between them all desperately before landing on Sasha again. He says, "Sash?" His voice breaks, pitching high, tears visible in his eyes.

Sasha nods, and Tim makes a sound not unlike a sob. 

She doesn't know who moves first; it doesn't matter, she supposes, because the next thing she knows, the two of them are colliding together. She's got her arms tight around Tim's shoulders, her face against his neck, and he is shaking with sobs. Whispering, "I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry," again and again. Sasha can't bring herself to answer. She just holds on as tight as she can and lets the tears fall. 

They stay like that a long time. Sasha doesn't know how long. Melanie King leaves, she thinks, says something about giving them space and how she can't believe this and about Jon playing the hero. Basira comes back in with glasses of water and leaves them on a pile of boxes. Jon stays, although he doesn't say a word; Sasha thinks at one point that he might be crying, too. She just hangs onto Tim, and he hangs on, too, even after the tears have stopped falling. They anchor each other to the ground. 

Eventually, Tim pulls away, keeps one arm still sort of around Sasha, but still pulls back and turns to Jon, who is watching them with an awed sort of apologetic gaze. "How are you feeling?" he says immediately, awkward and stilted, but genuinely concerned. The skin around his eyes is rubbed red and raw. "There's… there's water. If you're thirsty."

"Jon," says Tim, "what the fuck did you  _ do _ ?" 

Before he can answer, far off, there's the sound of the door opening. And then Martin's voice, rawer than Sasha ever remembered it and irritable, saying, "Jon, Daisy showed up in my office insisting you had to see me—threatening me, actually, telling me to come down here, I don't appreciate—" 

His voice cuts off with a stunned near-squeak, as he comes close enough to see, jaw dropping, staring at them both incredulously. Sasha, stumbling to her feet alongside Tim, takes him in. He doesn't look as bad off as Jon and Tim do—less scarred, for one. But he still looks beaten down, more rugged and tired and—and sadder. Right now, he looks really, genuinely shocked, like something cold has hit him in the face. Floored to his core. His mouth moves, although nothing comes out. 

"Martin," says Tim, laughing in a way that almost sounds like he's about to cry. He's shaky on his feet, leaning hard on Sasha. "It is— _ really _ good to see you. Really."

" _ Tim _ ?" Martin says, in disbelief. "And—and Sasha? You… you're here?"

Sasha nods, exhausted and ready to cry again and weirdly happy all at once. Still a little dizzy. Overwhelmed. "It's me, Martin. It's really me. I promise."

Martin looks at Jon, stumbling over his words, mouth still hanging open, then back at Tim and Sasha. "Oh my  _ god _ ." He jerks forward like he's going to embrace them, and then steps back like he's changed his mind, but Sasha steps forward with him, and then Tim, and then they both have their arms around him. Martin's hugging back just as tightly, his skin strangely cold to the touch, and Sasha just hangs on. Martin's crying. Jon makes a wet sort of sound and starts to walk past—mutters something about giving them privacy—but Sasha's reaching out and grabbing his hand and yanking him into the embrace before he can. He's stiff, almost nervous, but he doesn't pull away, and this time, Sasha is sure; Jon is crying, too. They all are.

"You… you brought them back," Martin says suddenly, over Tim's shoulder. Not a question. He's looking at Jon. "Like Daisy. You brought them back."

Jon hesitates for a moment, then nods. "Yes," he says quietly, and Sasha shuts her eyes, thinking of the blurring landscape and the faceless people, Tim's echoing voice and all the years she didn't know her name. Thinks about how glad she is that they're all here, even if she and Tim were lost and everyone else has clearly been through a lot. They're still here now. "Yes. I-I guess I did." 

**Author's Note:**

> hit me up on tumblr @ghostbustermelanieking, where i am still losing my mind daily over this podcast!


End file.
